When the Magisterium Becomes the Enemy

How anti-conciliar rhetoric undermines Catholic ecclesiology

Some might have noticed that I have been going after certain forms of traditionalism lately and putting energy into defending Vatican II and the liturgical reforms of Paul VI.

Why? Shouldn’t I just let the traditionalists exercise their freedom to critique Vatican II and the Novus Ordo? After all, Vatican II was merely a “pastoral council,” right? This is all just a matter of discipline, and faithful Catholics are allowed to disagree with the Magisterium when it comes to matters of discipline, right? So what’s the big deal? Why not just let the traditionalists continue in their legitimate criticisms of Vatican II and the Novus Ordo?

I want to say at the outset my purpose is not to shut down all criticism of Vatican II and the Novus Ordo. Much of it is legitimate. Much of it is in good faith. My purpose, rather, is to safeguard Catholic confidence that the Magisterium is assisted by the Holy Spirit, has always been assisted by the Holy Spirit (even at Vatican II), and will always be assisted by the Holy Spirit.

So I write about these issues because I love Holy Mother Church and because the very soul of the Church is at stake. I sometimes see the argument that “The Holy Spirit only protects the Church from falling into doctrinal heresy, and because Vatican II and Paul VI’s Missal only concern discipline, not doctrine, these teachings and promulgations are not protected by the charism of infallibility, and thus are fully open to critique.”

Technically, this is true. But we must be careful. Catholic doctrine distinguishes between:

• Infallibility: a negative protection from error in defined teachings

• Assistance: a positive guidance that accompanies the Church’s governing and teaching office more broadly

The Holy Spirit’s role is not merely that of an emergency brake preventing catastrophe. He is the soul of the Church, actively assisting her in teaching, governing, sanctifying, and prudentially ordering her life.

This is why the Church speaks not only of infallibility, but of religious submission of intellect and will to the ordinary Magisterium, even when it is not speaking infallibly.

That submission would be unintelligible if non-infallible acts were presumed to be merely human opinions with no divine assistance. With that said, I want to introduce a distinction between two different kinds of criticism:

• Legitimate critique: respectful, ecclesial, assumes good faith, recognizes assistance of the Holy Spirit

• Illegitimate critique: absolutizing failure, imputing abandonment by the Spirit, treating the post-conciliar Magisterium as an enemy

This is why I am so animated by this conversation. This is why I am putting so much energy lately into this debate (despite it being very spiritually taxing on my soul, especially as a new convert.)

I care about this issue so passionately because I see these vicious and unrelenting attacks on Holy Mother Church as causing actual harm among Catholics and also harming her evangelistic mission to non-Catholics. When you have an entire wing of the Catholic Church constantly and viciously attacking the ordinary Magisterium of the Church and saying things like, “Vatican II was an unmitigated disaster,” “The Missal of Paul VI was a total catastrophe,” or “The post-conciliar Church is just a bunch of liberal freemasonic modernist heretics” you are undermining people’s confidence that the Holy Spirit has been active at all in positively guiding Holy Mother Church in the second half of the twentieth century and beyond.

Indeed, traditionalists make it sound like the Holy Spirit just up and abandoned Holy Mother Church as soon as Vatican II was invoked. But Christ Himself promised us that:

• “The gates of hell shall not prevail against it” (Matt 16:18)

• “I am with you always, to the close of the age” (Matt 28:20)

• “The Spirit of truth… will guide you into all the truth” (John 16:13)

While Vatican I defined papal infallibility narrowly, it explicitly rejected the idea that the Holy Spirit assists the Magisterium only in extraordinary definitions.

“For the Holy Spirit was promised to the successors of Peter not so that they might make known new doctrine, but that they might religiously guard and faithfully expound the revelation handed down through the Apostles.”
(Pastor Aeternus, ch. 4)

Furthermore, in Lumen Gentium the Magisterium taught us that:

“This religious submission of mind and will must be shown in a special way to the authentic Magisterium of the Roman Pontiff, even when he is not speaking ex cathedra…
His mind and will in the matter may be known either from the character of the documents, from his frequent repetition of the same doctrine, or from his manner of speaking.”

This makes no sense unless the Church believes that:

• Non-infallible acts are genuinely assisted

• They are authoritative, not mere opinions

• Obedience to them is safe for the faithful

The Church cannot morally require submission to acts that might as such mislead souls. It has long been held by theologians that the Church cannot impose a universal law that is harmful to souls.

However, because these issues concern disciplinary issues rather than doctrine, it does not mean that Vatican II and the Novus Ordo, either in the Missal itself or its implementation, are beyond criticism. We can affirm that the Holy Spirit has positively guided Holy Mother Church for the good of the faithful while also acknowledging that not every prudential decision made by the Church was optimal or beyond reproach.

But the reason why I have been so animated to defend the Magisterium against these “mere prudential criticisms" is that I constantly see them being done in violation of the spirit of religious submission and in violation of the Canonical law that one ought not to stir up animosity or hatred against the Holy See. Instead, what I see constantly is an open hostility and anger at the Church and a total lack of reverence, basically making the entire Magisterium post-VII to be the enemy rather than the same Holy Mother Church that was guided by the Holy Spirit before and after Vatican II.

I do not believe most traditionalists intend this conclusion, but ideas have consequences, rhetoric forms instincts, instincts subtly shape belief systems, and belief systems inform how we speak and act.

And one thing I worry about is traditionalists forming isolated communities that self-consciously identify themselves as a “church within a church,” as a militant “remnant” that sees itself and itself alone as being guided by the Holy Spirit, battling against a corrupt Magisterium that the Holy Spirit has entirely abandoned. This manifests concretely in traditionalist communities self-consciously distancing themselves from the rest of the diocese and inculcating a spirit of elitism and disdain for the rest of the “normie Catholics.”

Now, with that said, I don’t want to deny the legitimacy and importance of addressing widespread liberalism and modernist tendencies within the Church itself, which is plain to all to see. But, in my opinion, we must be careful to fight such tendencies without thereby attacking Holy Mother Church so viciously that we cause the faithful to lose confidence that the Holy Spirit is still positively guiding the Church in such a way as to safeguard the faithful.

For many traditionalists, I recognize it might not be easy to see how the Holy Spirit could possibly still be at work in the Church given the lack of belief in the Real Presence, falling vocations, widespread usage of contraception, and a general spirit of liberalism within the Church, etc., etc.

But I would wager this is where faith comes in. We must have faith in the Church! She is the One True Religion! She cannot fail! Even when things seem dark, we must not lose hope in the Magisterium, nor should we lose the reverential attitude of religious submission even when it seems difficult to do so given many liberalizing tendencies within the Church hierarchy. But that is when our faithful submission is more meritorious: precisely when it’s difficult, not when it’s easy.